In a horrifying, true story from spring training, NESN's Heidi Watney tells how her dog is a virtual prisoner in its own home due to a nearby alligator (which may actually be a log).

Watney bravely takes camera in hand to not only show America where she lives (a dubious move), but also a small alligator which is lurking on the bank of a canal near her Florida condo. She won't let her dog out, she says, because it could "become a snack." It's all really the worst Man Vs. Wild episode I've ever seen. Will no one from the Red Sox go poke that gator with a stick to shoo it out of there? (Come on Papelbon; you know you want to).

So speaking of small dogs as potential snack food, this is as good a time as any for the Wiener Dog story. I lived in a condo in South Lake Tahoe a few years back that had two large garbage dumpsters at the end of the parking lot next to the forest. Bears would often frequent the dumpsters at night for a free buffet, but one afternoon a particularly brazen one showed up for lunch. A family in the condo across from mine had a wiener dog, who saw the bear through the screen door. The dog somehow got the screen door open and sped toward the dumpsters, barking madly, and the bear, startled, took off. They both disappeared into the woods.

About three minutes passed, in which the only sounds were the gentle rustle of the pine trees in the wind, and an occasional blue jay. Then, from out of the forest, comes the wiener dog running headlong back toward the condos, being chased by the bear. I can only surmise that somewhere deep in the woods the bear thought to itself "Wait a minute; I'm being chased by a freaking wiener dog." The dog sped back to his house and nosed inside through the screen door.

The funniest part to me was that when the wiener dog flew back into the house — and I swear, I don't know how this happened, because no one was home — the wooden door slammed shut behind him.